Posada Caught In Nightmare

MIKE BERARDINO ON BASEBALL

June 20, 1999|MIKE BERARDINO

These Year-After Yankees have many problems, left field and middle relief foremost among them. But nothing is as alarming and potentially fatal to their repeat hopes as the nightmare season Jorge Posada is experiencing.

When the Yankees stunned everyone last winter and re-signed Joe Girardi for one more season at $3.4 million, it seemed foolish to give a backup catcher that much money. Now, with the Posada Adventure growing more ghoulish by the day, it seems quite prescient.

This was supposed to be a break-through season for Posada, 27, a chance for a talented switch-hitter to claim the bulk of the playing time. But his first 2 1/2 months have been marked by a batting average below the Mendoza Line and a major league-leading 10 passed balls.

Just one big-league team had more passed balls, and that was the Red Sox (14), who annually top the charts thanks to knuckleballer Tim Wakefield. Entering the weekend, Posada was on pace for 26 passed balls, the most in the majors since Boston's Mike Macfarlane allowed the same number in 1995.

The modern single-season record belongs to Geno Petralli, who with Charlie Hough's help piled up 35 passed balls for the 1987 Texas Rangers (see chart). The all-time record? Try Ed Whiting of the 1882 Orioles, who had 105 passed balls.

You've heard of Steve Blass Disease and Steve Sax Disease, but is there such a thing as Bob Uecker Disease?

Things have gotten so bad that club officials sent Posada to a Connecticut optometrist last week, even though his eyes were already checked during spring training. There simply has to be some explanation, their reasoning goes, for all those pitches bouncing off Posada's mitt and rolling to the backstop.

His eyes aren't the reason. Optometrist Don Tieg found nothing amiss during a 90-minute battery of tests.

"I haven't been good. I've been trying to do too much," Posada said. "It's not my eyes. I knew it wasn't my eyes."

Yankees manager Joe Torre, a former catcher himself, knows how easy it can be for a player to take his batting woes with him into the field. Torre has maintained Posada's catching woes can be traced to a lack of "concentration and focus" that stems from his low batting average.

"One is related to the other," Torre said. "A lot of it's concentration. Because he's a catcher, it shows up more than if he were playing the outfield. You might not have a ball hit out there for two days. He's handling every pitch."

Posada had just seven passed balls all last season while sharing the job with Girardi. A converted second baseman, his hands are considered soft, his fundamentals solid.

Still, Posada has had his problems in the past. Twice he led his league in passed balls during his climb through the minors. In 1993, he allowed a whopping 38 passed balls while playing with Prince William in the Carolina League.

One positive for Posada has been his throwing. He had thrown out seven of 35 (.200) potential basestealers , ninth-best in the American League. Girardi, conversely, has dropped down to the 10 percent range.

"People are going to look at the passed balls and say he's having a bad defensive year, but he does a lot of other things well," said Girardi, an 11-year veteran. "Jorge calls a good game. He's throwing good. ... It's not for lack of effort. Nobody spends more time on drills every day than Jorge.

"Sometimes it just happens. It can get in your head a little. Once that happens, you become a little tense back there."

Other potential distractions for Posada include his contract status and a wedding that's set for this offseason. He is making $350,000 this year but will be eligible for salary arbitration after this season.

Girardi, for one, still believes in his fellow backstop.

"Jorge is going to be all right," Girardi said. "He'll look back on this in 4-5 years and say, `I learned more from that year than any other.' Right now he's struggling. How do you get through struggling? That's an important lesson in this game. It's not always going to be perfect."

Draft update

Three of the Marlins' top four draft picks remain unsigned, with No. 2 overall pick Josh Beckett foremost among those.

Marlins scouting director Al Avila met Wednesday night with Beckett's family and adviser Michael Moye in Spring, Texas. It was the second meeting between the two sides and the first at which dollar figures were exchanged.

Second-rounder Terry Byron, a hard-throwing right-hander from Indian River Junior College, is among those waiting for more players to sign and pull the market price higher. Just 11 of 30 first-rounders have signed.

Marlins sixth-rounder Charlie Frazier, a high school outfielder from Toms River, N.J., signed Thursday. That left just one other player unsigned between the fifth and 22nd rounds in the Marlins' draft class, and 12th-rounder Angel Sanchez (a catcher from Vineland, N.J.) was expected to sign soon rather than attend a junior college.